Heimskringla

Heimskringla, (c. 1220; “Orb of the World”), collection of sagas of the early Norwegian kings, written by the Icelandic poet-chieftain Snorri Sturluson. It is distinguished by Snorri’s classical objectivity, realistic psychology, and historically feasible (if not always accurate) depiction of cause and effect, all these counterbalanced by the pleasure he took, to use one literary historian’s words, in “artistic shaping of his source material.” The collection opens with the Ynglinga saga, which traces the descent...